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If some writers have an imperial phase, in which they hit the pinnacle consistently, then American writer John Irving’s lasted through a series of four fat, gratifying books, from his 1978 hit Garp to 1989’s A Prayer for Owen Meany. These were expansive, funny, big-hearted books, tying protagonists he describes as “outliers” to societal topics from feminism to termination.

After His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been diminishing results, except in word count. His most recent book, 2022’s The Chairlift Book, was 900 pages long of subjects Irving had examined more skillfully in prior novels (inability to speak, short stature, gender identity), with a 200-page film script in the middle to pad it out – as if filler were needed.

Thus we come to a new Irving with caution but still a small glimmer of optimism, which glows brighter when we find out that Queen Esther – a only 432 pages long – “goes back to the universe of The Cider House Rules”. That 1985 book is part of Irving’s finest works, located largely in an institution in the town of St Cloud’s, managed by Dr Larch and his protege Wells.

This novel is a failure from a novelist who once gave such delight

In Cider House, Irving wrote about pregnancy termination and identity with colour, humor and an comprehensive understanding. And it was a important work because it abandoned the topics that were evolving into annoying habits in his works: grappling, wild bears, Vienna, sex work.

The novel starts in the made-up village of the Penacook area in the beginning of the 1900s, where Thomas and Constance Winslow welcome young ward the protagonist from St Cloud's home. We are a several decades prior to the action of The Cider House Rules, yet Dr Larch stays familiar: already dependent on ether, adored by his nurses, starting every speech with “In this place...” But his appearance in Queen Esther is confined to these initial scenes.

The Winslows are concerned about raising Esther properly: she’s Jewish, and “how might they help a adolescent girl of Jewish descent discover her identity?” To address that, we flash forward to Esther’s adulthood in the 1920s. She will be a member of the Jewish exodus to the region, where she will enter Haganah, the Jewish nationalist armed organisation whose “goal was to defend Jewish communities from Arab attacks” and which would eventually form the basis of the Israeli Defense Forces.

Such are enormous topics to tackle, but having presented them, Irving dodges out. Because if it’s frustrating that the novel is not actually about St Cloud’s and Wilbur Larch, it’s even more disheartening that it’s additionally not really concerning Esther. For causes that must connect to plot engineering, Esther becomes a surrogate mother for another of the couple's offspring, and gives birth to a son, Jimmy, in the early forties – and the bulk of this novel is the boy's tale.

And at this point is where Irving’s preoccupations come roaring back, both regular and particular. Jimmy relocates to – of course – Vienna; there’s discussion of evading the Vietnam draft through self-mutilation (Owen Meany); a dog with a meaningful name (the dog's name, recall the canine from The Hotel New Hampshire); as well as wrestling, streetwalkers, authors and genitalia (Irving’s throughout).

He is a more mundane character than the heroine suggested to be, and the minor players, such as young people Claude and Jolanda, and Jimmy’s tutor the tutor, are flat too. There are several enjoyable episodes – Jimmy his first sexual experience; a brawl where a couple of bullies get beaten with a walking aid and a bicycle pump – but they’re brief.

Irving has not ever been a subtle author, but that is not the difficulty. He has consistently reiterated his arguments, telegraphed narrative turns and allowed them to accumulate in the viewer's mind before leading them to resolution in lengthy, surprising, funny sequences. For instance, in Irving’s works, physical elements tend to go missing: think of the tongue in The Garp Novel, the finger in Owen Meany. Those missing pieces echo through the narrative. In the book, a major figure suffers the loss of an limb – but we merely discover 30 pages later the finish.

Esther returns in the final part in the story, but only with a final sense of ending the story. We do not learn the entire narrative of her experiences in the region. The book is a disappointment from a author who once gave such pleasure. That’s the downside. The upside is that Cider House – I reread it together with this novel – even now stands up beautifully, four decades later. So choose the earlier work as an alternative: it’s double the length as the new novel, but 12 times as great.